Saturday, March 10, 2018

It is with great excitement that we announce the introduction of the Master Builders KwaZulu-Natal Membership Referral Programme which will enable members who participate, to drastically reduce their annual membership fee payment.

Those who are go-getters could see their annual membership fee discounted to ZERO!

How it works!

A member referring a prospective member who joins the Association will receive a discount equating to 10% of the new member joining fee. The prospective member must on their application form, verify which member it was that referred them and upon approval of membership, the account belonging to the member who made the referral will immediately be credited in lieu of their next membership invoice. The process is hassle-free and does not require any documentation from the member making the referral.

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Every year Arrive Alive wishes road users a safe happy festive season and shares some suggestions on how to maintain safety on our roads. We urge all members and readers to please take heed of the following Arrive Alive pointers:

Obey the rules of the road and carry you drivers license with you.

Plan the route to your holiday destination and give your self enough time to reach the destination

Make sure that your vehicle is in a roadworthy condition before departure. All lights and indicators, windscreen wipers, brakes, steering, exhaust system and tyres should be carefully examined for faults.

Do not overload.

Try to avoid driving after dark if possible.

Have a good rest before you embark on your journey

Take safety breaks every 2 hours or 200km

Do not drink and drive

Try to recognize potentially dangerous drivers on and pedestrians alongside the road and keep well clear of them

Be visible – drive with your lights on

Headlights should be dipped well before an approaching vehicle is within range of the main beam.

Always wear your seat belt and see that everyone in the car is wearing theirs.

Drive defensively

Stay within the speed limit at all times

Only overtake when it is absolutely safe to do so

Maintain at least a 2 second following distance - this distance should be increased at night, in foggy or rainy conditions and when the road is wet.

Monday, November 6, 2017

Metro.co.uk, recently published an article carrying the eye-catching headline “Boss sacks all staff to pursue his dream of not having to work with them”. It turns out that employees at Nippy Bus, which operated services across South Somerset in the UK, were informed by owner Sydney Hardy, that he was shutting the whole place down because he could not bear to put up with them “a moment longer”.

How disillusioned must he have been, to issue the following in a letter to all staff?

“There is a difference between giving up and knowing when you have had enough."

“I have had enough and realise I cannot work with you, the people I employ, a moment longer.”

“There comes a time in any relationship when you just have to say ‘**** **’, say goodbye and move on. This is my time! I am quitting to pursue my dream of not having to work here.”

“All staff should now consider themselves dismissed/redundant.”

"The gates are now closed and will not open, so you can stay in your scratchers and have a lie in.”

A brief note on the company’s website said it had ceased operating with immediate effect and that it had appointed agents to release assets and discharge liabilities.

Monday, October 2, 2017

Theft of electricity is not unique to South Africa and is an extremely dangerous undertaking, magnified by ten when the person doing the handiwork, doesn’t have the first clue.

17 April 2017, South Carolina USA, unable to pay their electricity bill, a family living in the Friendship community near Seneca had gone without power for several days. Although their service provider Blue Ridge Electric Company does advocate that there are options available to those who cannot pay, in this case, an alternative solution was explored.

In his bid to obtain grid power, the South Carolinian leaned an aluminium ladder up against a pole, climbed up and attached jumper cable clips to an energized conductor. A witness heard a shotgun like sound as 7200 volts arced from the primary wires across jumper cables (designed for 12 volts), through the man's body, down the ladder and into the ground.

After having been jolted from the top of the pole and thrown down to the ground, the man was taken to hospital and with contusions and electrical burns. Having amazingly survived, one wonders what bold endeavour he will attempt next, he is after all, truly a bright spark.

Saturday, September 2, 2017

CareerBuilder is an international recruitment agency with subsidiaries in the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia. According to a recent survey of theirs, more than 1 in 4 workers come to work late at least once a month and these are some of the popular excuses, the survey exposed.

I forgot it wasn’t the weekend.

I put petroleum jelly in my eyes.

I had to watch a soccer game that was being played in Europe.

I thought Flag Day was a legal holiday.

My pet turtle needed to visit the exotic animal clinic.

The wind blew the deck off my house.

I overslept because my kids changed all the clocks in the house.

I was cornered by a moose.

My mother locked me in the closet.

The pizza I ordered was late being delivered, and I had to be home to accept/pay for it.

The sunrise was so beautiful that I had to stop and take it in.

My mother-in-law wouldn’t stop talking.

My dad offered to make me a grilled cheese sandwich, and I couldn’t say no.

As is often the case with information such as this, one is left with more questions than answers: Who are these people, who is it that employs them and most curiously, who helps them tie their shoelaces in the morning?

Friday, August 4, 2017

Construction is by its very nature a stressful line of work. Often there are astronomical amounts of money involved and mistakes are exceedingly costly. It is undoubtably a high stakes game and it goes without say that on construction sites around the world, tempers do flare up and things can get heated.

The classified ad as depicted above, appeared in a 2012 Singaporean newspaper and reads as follows:

"Apology Notice

I, Choo Chuan Haut (NRIC no. SXXX6750D0 hereby sincerely apologise to Mr Woo (NRIC No. SXXX7740A) for hitting him in the face on 2 March 2012 in the construction site at Nanyang Technology University Singapore and causing him hurt and pain.

I Sincerely regret my action. I undertake that any similar incident will not happen in future.

CHOO CHUAN HAUT"

Out of sheer curiosity, I would dearly love know the background to this as the article poses more questions than answers:

Who was he to the project, the client, the contractor, the principle agent, foreman?

Who did he hit and what was it that provoked him?

Are all Singaporeans so polite by nature, that they immediately regret any such actions and feel compelled go to the enth degree, to express their remorse.

Or, was he then in so much trouble that it was in his best interest to show remorse.

Friday, June 30, 2017

March 2017, the lifeless body of a man was found in the roof space of a chemist shop in the Queensbury area in the UK.

Councillors Paul Cromie, an Independent for Queensbury ward, while speaking to a member of the Queensbury Matters Facebook group stated: “Someone has broken into the chemist shop on the High Street through the roof, unfortunately whilst breaking in he died in the roof space and has been dead for several weeks”.

It is believed that the man in an attempt to burgle the outlet, after removing roof tiles to gain access, became stuck and was stifled by his own clothes.

So what can one say about this?

The moral of the story: Occupational Health & Safety applies to all professions!

Sunday, June 4, 2017

Earlier this year, a Russian welder who worked for the Enterprise for the Construction, Repair and Maintenance of Highways in Tselinnoe, noticed how a fire extinguisher fitted perfectly into the barrel of an old decommissioned artillery howitzer cannon.

In his misguided belief that a fire extinguisher would make a great projectile, he charged the canon with acetylene, a hydrocarbon gas used in welding. When exploding from the howitzer, the abused fire extinguisher sent shrapnel spraying in all directions, resulting in the untimely demise of our aspiring bombardier.

Trained to use the elemental powers of hot plasma, welders are not normally daredevil types but this particular gentleman, was determined to prove the old adage:

'There are old welders and bold welders but there are no old, bold welders.'

Monday, May 1, 2017

For those of you who read the article on the National Road Traffic Regulations and are having difficulty accepting that the speed limit may soon be dropped by 20km per hour in most zones (60km per hour to 40km per hour, 120km per hour to 100km per hour etc) you may enjoy this true account:

Two British traffic patrol officers from North Berwick, east of Edinburgh, were involved in an unusual incident, while checking for speeding motorists on the A1 Great North Road.

One of the officers (who are not named) used a hand-held radar device to check the speed of a vehicle approaching over the crest of a hill, and was surprised when the speed was recorded at over 300mph. The machine then stopped working and the officers were not able to reset it.

The radar had in fact locked on to a NATO Tornado fighter jet over the North Sea, which was engaged in a low-flying exercise over the Borders district.

Back at police headquarters the chief constable fired off a stiff complaint to the RAF Liaison office.

Back came the reply in true laconic RAF style. “Thank you for your message, which allows us to complete the file on this incident. You may be interested to know that the tactical computer in the Tornado had automatically locked on to your ‘hostile radar equipment’ and sent a jamming signal back to it. Furthermore, the Sidewinder air-to-ground missiles aboard the fully-armed aircraft had also locked on to the target. Fortunately the Dutch pilot flying the Tornado responded to the missile status intelligently and was able to override the automatic protection system before the missile was launched.”

Sunday, April 2, 2017

(4 July, 1998, Texas) If you fly over Houston USA, you will see the
sky blue rectangles of countless backyard swimming pools. A Houston man
joined the club, and purchased his own above ground pool on June 21,
1998. He selected the location, and the pool was installed by an
independent contractor a few days later. He rated all aspects of the
installation as "excellent."

A few weeks later, the pool
owner was swimming with his friends and enjoying an alcoholic 4th of
July haze in the humid Houston heat.

In an unprecedented show of bravado, the man decided to climb onto his patio roof and dive into his pool.

The
man was six feet tall. His pool, typical for an above ground pool, was
four feet deep and needless to say it did not end well for him.

Key facts:

The client himself chose the location of the pool.

The client publicly rated the installation boasting how happy he was with the quality of the work.

It was he, all six foot of him, who took the ridiculous decision to take the dive.

Needless to say he was inebriated at the time of the incident.

The
family of the deceased brought a wrongful death claim against the
contractor on the grounds of faulty installation and inappropriate
location. Only in America!